


In A Cold Place

by Hatterized



Category: The Walking Dead (Comics), The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Angst, Comic Spoilers, Developing Relationship, Heavy Angst, M/M, it's very light smut but it's in there, takes place during the whispers war, would you believe I put smut in here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-31
Updated: 2017-03-31
Packaged: 2018-10-13 01:55:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10504023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hatterized/pseuds/Hatterized
Summary: Negan and Rick get closer after a peace treaty between them settles the dispute between their communities. They don't talk about it, but Rick is happy with how things are.And then the Whisperers show up.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is set in the TV canon, but it takes place where the comics currently are, so there will be some spoilers for the Whispers War up ahead. All Out War ends differently, though.

The first time they hook up, they don’t talk about it. And that sets the precedent for all of it, really.

Rick’s not sure what words they would use to ease the way.

Inevitable, maybe. Because that’s what it feels like to him. He feels caught up in Negan like the man is a force of nature and he's helpless to resist the push and pull of his tide, unable to stay away. It’s both something he never expected and has been anticipating for longer than he can remember.

So when he finds himself on his back, Negan between his thighs, he doesn’t question it. He doesn’t stop to think, _hey, maybe we shouldn’t_ , or _didn’t we used to hate each other_ , or _why the fuck does this feel so damn good_. He just lets himself feel it, surrenders for the first time to the crash of the waves.

After, they lay in silence. Rick lets his mind stay blank until Negan takes his leave. And it’s then that he starts asking himself the hard questions.

_What the fuck?_

_What was that?_

_Will it happen again?_

He still hasn’t figured out the answer to the first two, but he gets his answer to the third two days later, when they’re at it again, this time in the front seat of the truck they took out on their supply run, which, for some reason, is something they've started doing together.

And it keeps happening, these silent hook-ups where the only sound is of them breathing and groaning together. When they’re done, long silences stretch between them. Not uncomfortable ones. Just…quiet. Like they both know that there’s nothing more to be conveyed that their bodies haven’t already said for them.

The policy of not questioning it continues when things start to go deeper than quick, sweaty fucks in the cabs of trucks or against the walls of Rick’s house. The first time Rick kisses Negan goodbye, Negan doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t need to. Because the next time they see each other, he’s kissing Rick hello.

The first time Negan stays the night, there’s no discussion. They simply fall into bed together after a long day beyond the walls of Alexandria, stripping down to boxers and leaving a trail of clothes through Rick’s bedroom.

Neither one of them bring up the fact that Negan’s spending more time in Alexandria than at the Sanctuary, more time in Rick’s bed than in his own. Rick is fine with it, surprisingly. He’s always been a man of few words, and communication was always a point of contention with him and previous partners, but he never thought he’d be the one to let a relationship grow wildly without being defined. Controlling to a fault, he’s always been one to want to know where he stands, to have everything locked down with terms and conditions, i’s dotted and t’s crossed.

But with Negan, he finds that he doesn’t mind not having those things. Because, for some strange reason, they don’t need them. He finds it kind of funny, actually, that in Negan he’s found a partner that is already on this unspoken wavelength with him. _Negan_ , who talks more than any one man should, is somehow content to be silent with Rick.

Not that they don’t talk at all, because they do. About everything. About their pasts, the people they’ve lost and let down and nearly forgotten until they’re forced to think back. About their wives-Lori and Lucille, they always joke about how nice their L-names sound together- whom they both feel a similar wistful, nostalgic love for now that they’re long since gone. About how things are running at the Sanctuary now that Simon has mostly taken over in Negan's absence, about the alliance between their communities that came about as a result of a surprisingly peaceful treaty, about Rick’s kids and how fast they’re growing up.

Rick doesn’t even realize that Negan’s been living in his house exclusively for over a month until Carl brings it up over breakfast one morning. Negan’s following a recipe of Carol’s to make pancakes-actual pancakes- and Rick’s lifting Judith into her chair, when Carl speaks.

“So do you, like…live with us now?” There’s no disgust in his voice, not anymore. While he’d originally been resistant to Negan’s relationship with Rick, he’s come to accept it, come to see how much Negan’s changed in the years since the war between their communities ended.

Negan looks impassive as he slides a short stack of strawberry pancakes onto Carl’s plate. He’s wearing a ridiculous apron that Rick always teases him about.

“I dunno, kid. I guess I fucking do.” His gaze flicks up to Rick’s face for the briefest second, the barest hints of uncertainty in his hazel eyes, and it’s the closest they’ve ever come to talking about what they are. Rick frowns. He doesn’t like the question in Negan’s gaze.

“Yeah, he does.”

His answer earns him a kiss on the top of his head and a second helping of strawberry pancakes.

* * *

When Rick returns home from a visit to the Hilltop, Negan greets him with a kiss that’s just as all-consuming as he is.

“Anything new from Maggie?”

Negan doesn’t go with Rick to the Hilltop, ever. Maggie made it very clear as soon as Rick told her about what was happening between him and Negan that she wasn’t going to be hopping aboard the friendship train.

_He killed my husband, Rick. You get that, right? I understand that we’ve all done things we’re not proud of, and I believe you when you say he’s changed, I really do. But do not bring him here._

Negan didn’t take it personally.

_Fuck, Rick, of course she doesn’t want me up there. I can’t stay I blame her. If it had been a person that took Lucille from me instead of cancer, I wouldn’t have wanted to ever lay eyes on that fucker again, either. I’ll stay here and hold down the fort. Somebody’s gotta watch the little angel, right?_

So that had been that, no big deal. What Maggie had told Rick today, though…that was a big deal.

“Something’s goin’ on," Rick starts, pacing the floor while Negan leans against the kitchen counter, watching him. "A couple of Maggie’s men- strong, experienced guys- they got attacked by walkers. Two of them went down and…and the one that made it back, he’s sayin’ strange things.”

“Strange how?”

“He’s sayin’ the dead were whispering. That they were _communicating_ , talkin’ to each other.”

Negan laughs at that, full and guttural, rocking back on his heels.

“Shit, Rick! You look so fucking serious right now! What’s with the doom and gloom, blue eyes?”

Rick furrows his brow. “That doesn’t strike you as a little strange, Negan?”

Negan shrugs, unperturbed. “Guy probably lost his fucking marbles, Rick. It happens. Sees a couple of his buddies and _poof_ ,” he wiggles his singers next to his head, “his brain gets scrambled like eggs in a skillet. Are you honestly worried about this?”

“I…I don’t know. He sounded pretty sane. Not like he’d…gotten scrambled.”

Negan hooks his fingers into Rick’s belt loops, pulls him in close. “Rick, c’mon now. The dead don’t talk.”

As it turns out, Negan is right and wrong about that. The dead don’t talk.

Humans wearing the skins of the dead do, though.

That discovery isn’t made for another couple of weeks, though, when another one of Maggie’s scouts is attacked by a “walker” with a knife. This time, though, the patrol comes back with a prisoner: A teenage girl by the name of Lydia.

“She’s…she’s just a fucking _kid_.” Negan says when Rick tells him about his latest trip to the Hilltop. “Jesus Christ, Rick.”

And then a whole huge group of them shows up at the Hilltop, demanding Lydia’s safe return.

Led by a woman that goes by the title of Alpha, the Whisperers are…unexpected, to say the very least. From what they can gather, the people are animalistic, having long since abandoned societal standards and moral codes. They walk among the dead, wearing their skin, attacking humans only when their borders are breached.

Unfortunately, when Carl and Enid disappear into the Whisperers’ territory with Lydia, who turned out to be Alpha’s daughter, Rick doesn’t see much of a choice.

“I’m going. I have to go. I’m not just gonna leave Carl out there.” Rick holsters his gun on his belt, and Negan comes up behind him, hands warm and steady on his hips.

“Let me come, too. I can help you.”

The words are on Rick’s tongue: _I don’t want you out there, you could get hurt, I care about you too much to let you get hurt._

He can’t say them out loud, as part of their unspoken rule. He knows it’s ridiculous to ask Negan to stay behind, knows that the man is perfectly capable of handling himself. It’s just…it’s been a long time since he’s needed to.

But the words are too heavy in his mouth, so instead he says,

“Stay here with Judith. Please. I need to know she’s safe here if they come back.”

* * *

As it turns out, Negan would have been a hell of a lot safer by Rick’s side than back in Alexandria, because when he, Michonne and Carol return with Carl, they see it: a physical border staked out for them, a warning to anyone who tries to cross into Whisperer territory again. The heads of many of Rick’s friends top the stakes, some of them already turned, eyes clouded and teeth snapping at the wind. Negan’s head isn’t among them- in a terrified panic, Rick runs the line, checking each one- but he too easily could have been, and the horrible possibility of what could have been twists in his gut like a knife.

He can’t look away from the grotesque lineup. Michonne comes up beside him, lays a heavy hand on his shoulder. Together, they painstakingly slide knives into the temples of each of the people on the stakes.

When Rick gets back home, he tells Negan about everything they witnessed at the Whisperers’ camp: the almost wolflike hierarchy of power, the massive herd of walkers that they’d collected at a site nearby. Rick still can’t believe how many he’d seen. The swarm had been as vast an unending as an ocean, deep and infinitely more dangerous. He tells Negan about the border, and Negan’s all action, wanting to march straight into Whisperer territory to take on Alpha himself.

“Let me do it. I’m serious, Rick. Let me do it.”

“No.”

“Why the fuck not? They’ve never seen me, they wouldn’t know me from some random dickhead on the road.”

“No, Negan.”

“Rick, I can fucking do this. I know I can. You know how fucking persuasive I can be. I’ll be back in a few days, a _week_ , tops. I’ll charm my way right to the top and cut this all off at the head.”

“It’s too dangerous. You can’t trust that they’ll believe that you’re on your own. Someone could have seen you when they grabbed people for the…for the border. It’s too much of a risk. We're going to fight them, but I'm not letting you go on a suicide mission.”

Foolishly, naively, he takes Negan’s pouty silence as reluctant agreement.

When he wakes up the next morning to an empty bed, his heart sinks like a stone in a river, cold and heavy. There’s a note on the bedside table, but Rick knows what it says before he even picks it up.

_Rick,_

_Be back in a few days. You know I can do this. Don’t get your panties in a twist._

_-Negan_

Rick sits on the edge of the bed- Negan’s side of the bed- just staring at the note for what feels like hours. He can’t put it down, can’t stop reading and rereading it almost compulsively.

 _This is it_ , He thinks, _These could very well be his last fucking words to me._

The thought makes his eyes burn with unshed tears.

Each day that passes without Negan showing up on his doorstep, Rick feels more and more sick over it. He’s not sure what the worst part is: him being gone, or the fact that if Negan is dead out there somewhere, Rick may never know for sure. He could just be stuck here, waiting, always with that tiny sliver of hope that he'll come back.

“Where’s Negan?” Judith asks innocently, tugging at the cuff of Rick’s shirtsleeve as he slides her plate in front of her. It’s been Carol’s casseroles for dinner for days now, because Negan’s always the one who cooks. Rick is a hopeless chef, and Negan loved to tease Rick about his incompetence in the kitchen.

 _Loves_ , Rick corrects himself. _Present tense. He’s not dead._

“Daddy?” Judith’s small, worried voice pulls him back to reality, and he strokes her hair, putting on a brave smile to placate her.

“He’s out doing something for daddy, sweetheart. He’ll be back soon.” He forces a note of hopefulness into his voice, both to reassure Judith and himself.

When a week passes with no sign of Negan, Rick finally lets himself cry. He curls up on Negan’s side of the bed, clutching at sheets that still vaguely smell like their mingled scents, and lets the tears soak into his pillowcase.

* * *

Negan shows up on Rick’s doorstep after two excruciatingly long weeks, looking unshowered and a bit blood-spattered, but otherwise intact. In one hand he’s gripping a bag, and when Rick opens the door to see Negan there, he offers it to him.

Rick can’t raise his hands to take it. He barely registers its presence. All of his energy is going into holding himself back from flinging himself into Negan’s arms like a weepy sap.

“It’s Alpha’s head. I did it, Rick. It told you I could fucking do it.” Negan has the decency to look apologetic, to not rub Rick’s obvious distress in his face. He looks down, sees the way Rick’s hands are shaking, and drops the bag, pulling Rick into his arms.

“I’m sorry. I’m fucking sorry, Rick. I know you’re probably pissed at me. Hell, I know I would be. But I wouldn’t have gone if I didn’t think I could do it. Wouldn’t have gone if I thought I wouldn't come back.” Rick swears he can almost hear the rest of his sentence, hanging, unsaid as always, in the air between them:

_Wouldn’t have gone if I thought I wouldn't come back to you._

Rick grips at the back of his jacket, fingers scrabbling at the leather, his face buried in the broad chest, and he feels the burn of tears behind his eyes again, but he can’t let them fall. Instead, he pulls Negan inside and up the stairs and into their room that Rick’s been sleeping in alone for the last two weeks.

“Show me,” He demands, shoving Negan back onto the bed with more force than necessary. “Show me how sorry you are.”

He does. He takes his time with it, tracing hot lines over Rick’s body as he strips him bare and lays him out on the sheets. It’s slow in a way that it rarely is with them, Negan kissing every inch of Rick that he can almost reverently, and it’s in those warm brushes of lips against his neck, his stomach, his thighs, that Rick hears Negan’s apology. It's there, in the delicious slide of skin on skin, in the way Negan fills him so good it makes him ache.

_I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry._

Negan rocks his hips into Rick at a snail’s pace, their bodies pressed as close as they can get, hazy eyes locked on each other as their foreheads touch, and Rick sees something in Negan’s eyes as they move together. Sees an admission that he, like Rick, can’t say out loud:

_I was scared I’d never see you again._

Rick takes some comfort in knowing that he’s not the only one getting sentimental.

* * *

Four days. Four days is all the reprieve they get before all hell breaks loose. As retribution for Alpha’s murder and the breach of borders, the sea of walkers that Rick had been shown back at the Whisperers’ camp is unleashed on Alexandria.

“The gates aren’t going to hold!” Rick’s eyes go wide in panic as the front gate of Alexandria creaks and then suddenly gives away against the crushing weight of the bodies thrashing and snarling against it. The screeching clatter of metal is deafening, and people scatter, running to their homes, to the ladders leading up to the lookout stations, anywhere that gets them away from the teeming masses of undead bodies and snatching fingers. Rick fires off all the rounds in his Colt before bringing out his knife, stabbing one after the other in a panicked rage until he feels himself being jerked backwards by the collar of his jacket. Fear grips him for a split second, thinking that one of them has him, that this is it- and then he hears Negan shouting over the snarls of the dead around him.

“Rick, you stupid fuck! You can’t kill them all! Come the fuck on!” He’s tugging at Rick’s jacket again, pulling him back, and Rick turns to follow him, breaking into a run as they try to make their way to shelter, showing walkers away as they go. Rick loses Negan for a fraction of a second in the teeming mass of bodies, but then he reappears beside Rick, grabbing his arms and pulling him alongside himself until they’re in front of one of the houses. He all but throws Rick inside before slamming the door shut behind himself, and they immediately set to work, shoving all the furniture in front of the doors. When everything is properly blocked off, they make their way to the topmost floor of the house and collapse, spent, onto the hardwood floor of the bedroom.

“Fuck. _Fuck!_ ” Negan hisses, shaking. Rick’s never seen him like this, so visibly shaken, especially by walkers. He’s always maintained that people were the real enemy now.

That’s still mostly true, Rick thinks. It was real, living people that collected these things, set the hoard loose on Alexandria. But this is the first time in a long time Rick’s felt like the undead were the top priority enemy.

“We can get out of this.” Rick says, scooting closer to Negan. “We can. We’ll take a breather here, get our bearings, map out an escape plan. If we can grab a couple of them, use the insides to mask our smell- we can make it to the armory, grab all the guns we can carry, get on the roof and start shooting. We’ll keep doing that in waves until-

Rick’s words evaporate in his mouth mid-sentence when he sees something on the back of Negan’s neck, a blinding flash of red.

He suddenly can’t breathe.

Negan sees his face change and looks pained.

“Rick,” He says, voice soft.

Rick shakes his head. No. _No._

Negan unzips his jacket, slides it off his broad shoulders. There’s blood running down the nape of his neck into his collar, staining his white t-shirt a violent shade of crimson.

Rick reaches out one shaking hand, pushes Negan’s head to the side, feeling like his arm is disconnected from his body because it can't possible be attached to him if this is really what he's touching.

A gaping wound, fresh and wet, teeth marks around the missing chunk of flesh. It’s not deep. But it doesn’t have to be.

Negan’s voice is tight and pained. “Rick.”

Rick’s vision tunnels so that the only thing he can see is the wet scarlet on the back of Negan’s neck.

 _This isn’t real. It can’t be real. He’s faking it somehow. This is a nightmare. I’m going to wake up._ Rick’s mind is both spinning out of control and caught in a dead stop and the confusion and absolute mind-numbing devastation of it all makes him want to heave the contents of his stomach right there at Negan’s feet, bet there's nothing there to throw up. Instead, he feels his breaths start to come short and fast, his vision blurring.

“ _Rick._ ” Negan says, his voice sharp with something like fear and hearing him like that pushes Rick right over the edge.

“What the fuck. _What the fuck, Negan?_ Are you fucking stupid? _Are you seriously this fucking stupid_?” Rick hears himself screaming, knows that making this much noise is the last thing he should be doing right now, but he can’t stop. It’s like a dam inside him has broken and the only way he knows how to patch it is by yelling himself hoarse. “You got yourself fucking _bitten_? How long have you been out here? _How long_? What kind of useless piece of shit gets himself bitten after _this long_?” He’s on his feet, but he’s not sure how or why, because he doesn’t remember standing up. He keeps hurling abuse at Negan even though he knows it’s useless and unfair of him, that he's not really mad at _Negan._  Rage burning in his chest as he throws all of Negan’s favorite words- _fuck, shit, useless motherfucker, goddamn cocksucker-_  back at him, and Negan just takes it, his eyes boring into Rick’s.

And then Rick hears his own voice break on a violent curse, and he slides back into himself all at once. He’s intensely aware of his own body suddenly, at the way he feels too cold but also overheated, how violently he’s shaking, uncontrollable tremors rolling through him. He feels something salty drip down his beard and into his mouth, and when he brings a hand up to wipe it away, he expects his fingers to come back stained the same red that’s all over Negan. Because that would be the real kicker, wouldn’t it? If they both fucking died up here like a pair of jackasses.

Instead, they’re just wet. He lifts one trembling hand and swipes at his face without any gentleness, because somehow the fact that he’s crying right now makes him even angrier.

He dares to meet Negan’s eyes for the briefest second, and all of the rage drains out of him so quickly that he can’t stop himself from sinking to his knees. He stares at the wooden floor, at the grooves in the glossy planks and the little cracks between them, tracing a map over them with his eyes, willing himself to calm down.

He’s not sure how long they sit in silence together, with him staring at the floor and Negan leaning against the wall. Rick fades in and out of reality during the stretch of quiet, sometimes hearing nothing but the blood rushing in his ears, sometimes hearing the too-heavy sound of Negan’s breathing and the groaning and scratching of the walkers outside.

“I’m sorry, Rick.” Negan whispers. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

It’s like a knife in Rick’s chest, hearing those words. He’s immediately dragged back to Negan’s last apology, only a few days ago. He thinks of how it had ended then, with Negan sheathed inside of him, their bodies rocking together like ships on breaking waves.

 _You’re never going to have him like that again_ , Rick’s mind jeers, _You’re never going to have him in your house, in your bed, in your body. You’re never going to wake up to him beside you, come downstairs to him making breakfast in that stupid fucking apron. Never going to see him playing with Judith, never going to see him smiling or swearing or laughing-_

The thought just about makes him break right then and there, but he clenches down on it, wills himself to show a little backbone. He pushes the heels of his hands into his eyes, a little harder than is entirely necessary to stave off the waterworks, and forces himself to look over at Negan again.

“Don’t,” He says, his voice small. “Don’t be sorry. It’s too late to be sorry.”

“You’re right, though,” Negan says, shaky. “Who the fuck gets bitten anymore, right?”

Rick shakes his head. “Stop. Just…stop.”

They’re quiet again for a bit, and Rick, as if drawn in by gravity, finds himself sliding over next to Negan, leaning on him.

“You’re not gonna want to hear this,” Negan murmurs above him, “But you can use this to your advantage, you know.”

Rick’s blood turns to ice. “What the hell does that mean?”

Negan’s voice is cold, detached. “Well, I mean. I’m already fucking dead, right? No getting around that.”

Rick shudders. “Negan.”

“Hear me out, Rick. Please. If I’m already dead, I may as well be of some use to you, right?”

“Stop.” Rick pleads, not wanting to hear it. He’s not sure what he’ll do if he has to hear it.

“I can go out there, try to take a few of those undead fucks out as I go down. Between that and some deadie guts smeared on you, you should be in the clear, no problem.”

Rick’s stomach churns unpleasantly. “No."

“Rick, come the fuck on. I know we’re fucking, but you can’t get sentimental on me right now-”

“Stop!” Rick yells, shooting up to his feet and away from Negan, the hurt in his voice palpable. Negan must get the message, because he shuts up, and Rick curses himself for feeling so wounded at the implication of what Negan just said.

_Fucking. Just fucking. Don’t get sentimental._

Negan wipes at his forehead, and Rick sees the beads of sweat forming at his hairline and soaking through his thin shirt.

_The fever’s starting to set in. Fast._

Rick swallows down his hurt feelings and stoops down to Negan’s level, offering him an arm. Negan stares at it uncertainly.

“C’mon. Gonna make you more comfortable.” Negan takes his hand and Rick leads him to the bed, helps him settle under the sheets before crawling up next to him.

“We just gonna stay here, Rick?” Rick picks up on something under the words, a note of hopefulness.

 _Fuck it_ , he thinks. He can still hear the hoard battering the walls of the house. Even if he did manage to get one of them inside without the rest flooding in, he’s not sure it would be enough to keep that many off of him. It would be smarter to wait it out, give them time to disperse a little. 

And if that gives him enough time to stay with Negan, to wait until the infection takes him, so be it. He can't leave him, not while he's still breathing.

“Yeah. Yeah, we’re gonna stay here.” Rick murmurs into Negan’s shoulder.

“Until I go?”

Heavy, crushing pain spreads through Rick's chest at the words, but he manages a response.

“Yes.”

Negan nods, almost imperceptibly, before managing a quiet “Thank you,” into Rick’s hair. He turns onto his side so he can face Rick, one hand sliding around Rick’s waist and tugging him closer. Rick sees a lot of things in his eyes in that moment: fear, guilt, anger, frustration, desperation, affection.

“I didn’t…” He starts, eyebrows knitting together with guilty concern. “I didn’t mean it like that, Rick. When I said…when I said we were fucking. You know that, right? You can’t possibly be fucking stupid enough to think that that’s all I see you as after everything-”

Rick puts an end to his words by sealing his lips to Negan’s in a bruising kiss. He’s not ready to hear this, not yet. He thought he was, thought it would be comforting to hear some kind of verbal affirmation after all this time, but he knows what it is: a dying man’s confession. And he’s not ready for that.

Negan pulls back, lips flushed. “Rick-”

Rick shakes his head firmly. “No. Not yet. Just-not yet.”

Negan nods, understanding what he means, not wanting to push. “What do you wanna do all night then, if we’re not gonna spill our fucking guts and talk about our _feelings_ , Rick?” He says the word mockingly, like it embarrasses him.

“What do you want to do?” Rick volleys back at him, and Negan’s face breaks into the wide Cheshire grin Rick’s come to adore.

“Oh, Rick. What kind of stupid fucking question is that?”

Rick shoots him a disbelieving look. “You’re joking.”

Negan pushes his lower lip out in a pathetic mockery of a pout. “What, you don’t wanna fuck me, Rick? Can’t even grant my my dying wish? Give me a nice, _long_  last meal, maybe?” He stares pointedly at Rick’s crotch, and if Rick didn’t feel like his whole world was crumbling around him, he would have laughed. As it is, he just maintains the incredulous glare he’s giving Negan.

“C’mon, Rick,” He croons, his voice low and heavy like stormclouds between them, “I wanna go out with a bang.”

Rick’s thoughts from earlier are dredged back up: _You'll never have him like that again_.

So, yeah, maybe it’s the most ridiculous last request ever. But Rick finds that he can’t turn it down. In lieu of saying yes, he moves over Negan, covering the taller man’s body with his own. The kiss starts slow and then turns desperate, and even though Rick would have thought he would want to drag the whole thing out for as long as possible, neither of them can commit to the slowness. Instead, they’re a mess of hands and mouths devouring each other like they’re starving. Rick is on Negan, and then he’s in Negan, and it’s too much too fast but neither of them care enough to take their time. All Rick can think is that he needs Negan closer, right fucking now.

Neither of them last long, and after they’re both shaking and sweating and spent, plastered together between the sheets, they start laughing. It’s a desperate, almost manic laughter that seems to infect them both at once, and they can’t stop until they’re both clutching their sides and wheezing in tandem.

“I can’t fucking believe you actually did that. I can’t believe you actually fucked me for one last goddamned hurrah.” Negan chortles, wiping tears of mirth from the corners of his eyes.

“I can’t believe you’re about to die and you’re still trying to get laid.”

Negan draws him in close, curls their bodies together. “I died as I lived, Rick. You’d better fucking tell them that.”

* * *

The rest of the night is spent distracting each other from reality. Negan tells Rick stories about his life with Lucille before the world ended, how she’d always kept him in line, how she was the only woman who could ever complete him like that, making him a whole person.

Rick tells him about what Carl was like when he was younger, how he’d been a sweet but feisty kid, how he’d wanted to grow up to be a cop, just like his dad. How the idea of that had scared him at the time. How ridiculous that fear seemed now, considering what Carl was living in.

As the hours pass, Rick can tell Negan is getting worse. His breathing goes shallow and sounds painfully labored, his skin looks unnaturally pale and drained, and Rick can feel the heat radiating off of him as they lay close together, but Negan never pulls away.

It’s well into the late hours of the night that Negan’s face turns serious.

“Rick. We had some good times, right? You…you had a good time with me?”

Rick swallows hard, past a lump in his throat. “Yeah.”

Negan reaches up, presses a clammy hand against the side of Rick’s face, his thumb tracing the plush of Rick’s lips. “Good. Cause I had a real fucking good time with you, Rick. The best since Lucille. I loved it, being with you. Loved being a part of a…a fuckin’ family.” He swallows roughly, and his words sound like they’re being ripped out of some deep, painful place inside of him. “Loved you. Love you.”

Rick can’t respond. He can’t do this now, but all that they have left is right now. He feels his throat getting thick, the backs of his eyes burning. He opens his mouth to say it, and he can’t. Even now, he still can’t get the words out.

“Shit, Rick. Don’t start fucking crying on me right now.” Negan laughs, wheezy and dry. “Never would’ve guessed this would be how I go, you know? Never would’ve thought you’d be the one crying over me. First time I saw you, on your knees outside that RV, eyes full of tears, I never would have guessed I’d see you turning on the fucking waterworks like that for me.”

Rick wants to say something, anything. Snap at him for bringing up the night they met and all the painful memories that come with it. He wants to choke out the three little words clogging up his throat. But his tongue is lead in his mouth. Negan keeps talking for him.

“I feel like this goes without saying, but I’m gonna need you to kill me before I turn. I…I killed too many people while I was alive. Do me a favor and don’t let me add to that body count when I’m dead.”

Rick nods. He can do that. It’ll hurt, but once Negan’s gone, everything is going to hurt, so what’s a little more?

“Thank you,” Negan whispers hoarsely, and then he adds, “For everything, Rick. Thank you for everything. For fucking…forgiving me, for letting me into your life.”

Rick can only manage a nod.

“Do you…do you regret it? Being with me, with it ending like this?” Negan’s voice is so small, so vulnerable, and that’s what does it for Rick. That’s what finally breaks him. The tears that have been pooling behind his eyes all day spill over his face, and when he manages to spill out an answer between hitching breaths, his voice is rough and broken like it’s been raked over shards of glass.

“I don’t- I could never regret you, Negan. Not ever. Even- even now, I wouldn’t take it back. Not for anything. I-” He swallows hard, tears dripping like rain onto Negan’s shirt. “I love you.”

Negan pulls him in for a salty kiss, whispers his words against Rick’s trembling lips, _I love you, too._

They stay like that, forehead to forehead, until Negan’s breathing slows down, then stops completely.

Rick stares at him for a long minute, dead silence between them. He almost expects Negan to suddenly open his eyes, yell _Gotcha!,_ make Rick jump out of his skin.

But he doesn’t. He’s completely still, and his eyelids stay closed, and when Rick’s tears drip down onto his cheek, he doesn’t respond.

Rick takes a shuddering breath and then he’s sobbing. His head drops down to Negan’s chest and he clutches at his shirt, shaking violently and twisting the material in his grip. He can’t breathe, his chest feels like it’s on fire, and he hiccups and gasps for air, his whole body heaving.

He doesn’t know how long he stays like that, hunched over Negan’s unresponsive body and soaking his shirt, but after a long time, he comes back to himself enough to remember Negan’s request. He slides off the bed, knees shaky as jello underneath him, and fumbles on the floor for his knife. He has to work himself up to walking back over to the side of the bed, blade poised at Negan’s temple.

And then he does it. Quick and simple, he steels himself and looks blankly at the wall, unable to watch the movement of the knife into Negan's skull. With shaking hands, he wipes the blade on the bedspread, leaving a red stain beside Negan’s body.

He sinks down onto the floor, knees drawn up to his chest, and takes deep breaths, forcing himself to be calm, willing his body to get its shit together so he can get out of this house. He has to make it out. Has to get back to everyone, to Carl and Judith. He has to carry on. If he was to stay here and let the heaviness of grief crush him until he’s immobile, he could never forgive himself. Negan would never forgive him for using his death as a reason to give up.

Out the window across from the bed, Rick sees orange beginning to flood over the tops of the trees. It’s morning. The banging of rotting hands on the outside of the house has slowed considerably, and Rick forces himself to his feet. He turns toward the bed, spares himself one last look at Negan. The man looks peaceful for once in his life, Rick thinks. He leans in close, presses his lips to the cold forehead, whispers the three words that he didn’t say enough while he was alive.

Rick turns to leave, heading for the door and reaching for the doorknob, but then stops short. Out of the corner of his eyes he sees it on the floor, crumpled in a ball where Negan had first shed it so many hours ago. He takes a couple steps and snatches Negan’s leather jacket off the floor.

He looks it over for a moment, remembering the way it had looked on its owner, the way Negan's shoulders had filled it out, before sliding it on over his own button-up shirt. It’s a little big on him, the sleeves just a bit longer than they should be, but he doesn't care. He zips it all the way up, slides his knife into one of the pockets, and, with newfound resolve, steps out the door.

**Author's Note:**

> I never thought I'd write major character death because reading it causes me endless pain but here I am, causing myself endless pain. The title of this fic comes from the song HELP by The Front Bottoms, specifically one line: "Thank you for letting me borrow your jacket, it kept me warm in a cold place."
> 
> Small thing I drew to go with this: http://hatterized.tumblr.com/post/159019372147


End file.
